Red Raider Track and Field wraps up Big 12 Championships

Benard Keter

LAWRENCE, Kansas – The Texas Tech track & field team wrapped up the last day of the Big 12 Track & Field Championship today with 19 All-Big 12 honors, a conference champion and an all-time school record.

"Today we wound up having a lot better day than yesterday, I was really proud of our kids and how we competed right up to the mile relay," Head Coach Wes Kittley said.

Benard Keter staked a claim for his second Big 12 title of the weekend, running a 14:11.75 in the men's 5,000-meter race. This marked Keter's third Big 12 title this year and fourth in his career. His first title of the year was secured at the cross country conference championship and his second just yesterday in the 3,000-meter steeplechase.

"A great win by Benard, a very exciting 5,000-meter race. I couldn't be more proud of him, showing up and getting two wins in the conference championship."

Drew McMichael had a breakthrough in the men's pole vault, which earned him a second-place finish overall. The sophomore came into this weekend's competition ranked 6th_ in the conference with last week's personal-best bar of 5.32m/17-5.50. McMichael notched four personal records during his competition with a best of 5.51m/18-1 to match the all-time school record from Brit Pursley in 1989. McMichael is now ranked 10th in the nation with his new personal-record height.

"Drew really had a big day and it was great to see him go out and perform like he did. He went from the forties to No. 10 in the nation which is a big jump."

Another silver medal was claimed by Zarriea Willis in the women's high jump. Willis cleared the first _ bars in her first attempt, then went on to clear a best final bar of 1.79m/5-10.50.

Vincent Crisp also took a second place finish for the Red Raiders with his 800m run of 1:50:25.

Crisp served as the anchor on the men's 4x400 relay also composed of Steven Champlin, Kyle Collins and Andrew Hudson. The quartet clocked a 3:05.40 run to earn second overall.

"All of the second-place finishes were really good for us. Our relay, especially, was a good note for us to end on leading into the prelims."

The 400-meter dash was headed by Kyle Collins on the men's side and Marika Brown on the women's. Collins finished third clocking a 46.53 dash while Brown took fourth with a time of 53.99

Darien Tennon ran both the 110-meter hurdles and 400-meter hurdles to wrangle two fourth-place finishes. Tennon paced runs of 13.82 and 52.83.

Competition was stout today in the women's triple jump where Latham claimed a fifth-place finish of 13.54m/44-5.25

In two weeks the Red Raiders will head back to Austin, Texas, for the NCAA West Preliminaries on May 25-27.